Week in Photos

Thai-Chinese devotees carry an icon while walking through a fire during the annual festival at Chao Mae Lim Ko Nieo temple in Thailand’s southern province of Yala. Chao Mae Lim Ko Nieo, a goddess believed to possess potent magic powers, is revered by the Chinese in Yala and other provinces of southern Thailand.

AFP/Getty Images

Jordanian youths ride their camels at the Dead Sea beachfront, 34 miles southeast of Amman, Jordan.

AP Photo

Australian soldier Steve Carter, right, assists flood victims to evacuate to a RAAF Black Hawk helicopter south of Charleville.

AFP/Getty Images

Anders Behring Breivik, a right-wing extremist who confessed to a bombing and mass shooting that killed 77 people on July 22, 2011, gestures as he arrives for a detention hearing at a court in Oslo, Norway.

AP Photo

Members of The Kings Troop Royal Horse Artillery fire during the Accession Day 41 Gun Salute to mark the official start of Queen Elizabeth II’s Diamond Jubilee in Hyde Park, London.

AP Photo

A motorcyclist drives through a flooded road in Bata, Equatorial Guinea.

AP Photo

An Indian man paddles a raft to a concrete island, meant to be part of an overpass construction project but is now derelict, as he searches for items to salvage in the holy River Yamuna, in New Delhi, India.

AP Photo

A worshipper pierces his cheeks with metal skewers during Cap Go Meh festival that marks the end of Lunar New Year celebrations in Jakarta, Indonesia.

AP Photo

An Egyptian woman runs away after being caught between riot police and stone-throwers during clashes near the Interior Ministry in Cairo, Egypt.

AP Photo

A warning sign starts to disappear below floodwaters near Charleville, about 426 miles west of Brisbane. Thousands of Australians were forced from their homes on Monday because of floods that have risen to record levels in some areas.

REUTERS

A participant arrives at the camping area of the VI edition of the Campus Party event in Sao Paulo, Brazil.

AP Photo

Britain’s Queen Elizabeth smiles as she leaves Town Hall in King’s Lynn, in Norfolk, eastern England. Today marks the 60th anniversary of Queen Elizabeth’s accession to the throne.

REUTERS

A sunken houseboat is seen on the frozen Zwanenburgwal canal in Amsterdam. Due to severe frost the waterpipes of the houseboat burst open and caused the boat to sink. No casualties were reported.

A vehicle loaded with a dead body manuevers over a road damaged damaged by a 6.8 magnitude earthquake, in the in the village of Tuway, central Philippines.

AFP/Getty Images

People ride a boat in the flooded streets in the town of Svilengrad. Rescue operations are continuing in the southern village of Bisser which was completely flooded after a nearby dam collapsed.

AP PHOTO

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, (C) rides a boat duirng a visit to Navy Unit 158 in an undisclosed location in North Korea.

AP PHOTO

Parents and students of Miramonte Elementary School finish a march to the site of a meeting with Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent (LAUSD) John Deasy where he announced that the entire teaching staff of Miramonte Elementary School will be relocated in the wake of the arrests of two teachers in a child sexual abuse scandal in Los Angeles.

REUTERS

Tibetans sit on a motor cart waiting for a lift outside a monastery after attending a religious ceremony at a monastery in Jiuzhaigou, northwestern China’s Sichuan province.

AP PHOTO

Puerto Rico’s Johnny Monell (C) celebrates with teammates at home plate after scoring the game-winning run during a Caribbean Series baseball game against Mexico at Quisqueya stadium in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.

AP PHOTO

A transport ship makes its way through the ice on the Rhine-Herne canal in Gelsenkirchen, Germany.

AP PHOTO

A Hindu devotee with hooks embedded into his back takes part in a procession during the Thaipusam festival at Batu Caves in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

AP PHOTO

Maldives police officers throw tear gas canisters during a clash with army soldiers in Male, Maldives. The first democratically elected president Mohamed Nasheed of Maldives resigned Tuesday after police joined the protesters and then clashed with soldiers amid protests over his controversial arrest of a top judge.

AP PHOTO

A man touches a statue of charging bull which is a similar version of the Wall Street Bull in Shanghai, China.

AP PHOTO

A woman covers her face against cold wind as she walks past snow-covered stairs at the Koenigsplatz in Munich.

REUTERS

Mark Cavendish (L) of Team Sky sprints ahead of Tom Boonen of Omega Pharma – Quick-Step during a sprint finish for the 91 miles third stage of the Tour of Qatar cycling race between Dukhan and Al-Gharafa Stadium, in Doha.

REUTERS

Residents look at a destroyed bridge over the river Nalon in Trubia, northern Spain. The bridge collapsed by the force of the water due to heavy rain in the last few days, but no casualties were reported after the accident.

REUTERS

A United States Marine Corps helicopter flies past the full moon and the US Capitol in Washington, DC.

NASA/Barcroft Media

UN peacekeepers patrol as Haitians search through the rubble after a fire swept through a tent city in the center of Port-au-Prince, Haiti. The fire claimed the lives of at least three people with several people still missing.

AFP/Getty Images

Pedestrians walk next to a beggar in central Athens. Leaders of the three parties backing Prime Minister Lucas Papademos’ interim government were poring over a draft of a new austerity program demanded by Greece’s creditors to continue providing rescue loans to the debt-crippled country.

AP Photo

Police officers enter Weeksville School in Brooklyn. A New York City teacher’s aide at the school already accused of possessing child pornography was jailed Tuesday after prosecutors brought new allegations that he videotaped himself spanking one naked child and fondling another in a public elementary school classroom.

AP Photo

A Maldivian army soldier, left, and police officer take cover as a supporter of Mohamed Nasheed, who resigned Tuesday from his post as Maldivian President, hurls back a tear gas canister thrown during a protest in Male, Maldives. Supporters of Nasheed rioted through the streets Wednesday demanding he be reinstated as the country’s new leader appealed for unity to end the months of political turmoil roiling the Indian Ocean island nation.

AP Photo

Performers wear rooster costumes and give out good luck messages to locals during a parade celebrating the Chinese Lunar New Year in Wen county of Jiaozuo city, Henan province.

REUTERS

John H. Briggs fishes for mullet in St. Andrew Bay in Panama City, Fla. Briggs said he has fished every other day for the past six years.

AP Photo

A Hindu holy man shows his ink-marked finger after casting his vote at a polling station in Ayodhya during the state assembly election, in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.

REUTERS

First lady Michelle Obama participates in a tug of war with Jimmy Fallon in the Blue Room of the White House during a “Late Night with Jimmy Fallon” taping for the second anniversary of the White House “Let’s Move!” initiative.

REUTERS

People work at the scene where a subway train was involved in a crash in Santiago Wednesday morning during a test run.

REUTERS

Lori Campbell, left, and Maja Roble, who are engaged, kiss at a celebration rally for Tuesday’s ruling on Proposition 8 in West Hollywood, Calif.

REUTERS

People stand next to a natural ice sculpture that was formed after the wind blew waves over the boardwalk of Lake Geneva at the Port of Choiseul in Versoix near Geneva, Switzerland.

AP Photo

George Huguely V, arrives at the Charlottesville Circuit courthouse for the start of his trial in Charlottesville, Va. Huguely is charged with the murder of fellow University of Virginia senior Yeardley Love.

AP Photo

A tourist rides a camel at the Clifton beach in the southern Pakistani city of Karachi.

ZUMAPRESS.com

President Obama reacts as 14-year-old Joey Hudy of Phoenix, Arizona, launches a marshmallow from Hudy’s “Extreme Marshmallow Cannon” during a tour of the White House Science Fair in the State Dining Room of the White House in Washington, DC.

AFP/Getty Images

A boat makes its way through floating ice on the river Elbe in Hamburg, Germany. A cold spell has reached Europe with temperatures plummeting far below zero.

AP Photo

A man stands between dump trucks at the Belarusian Autoworks (BELAZ) plant during an international conference “Dump Truck Transport 2012″ in Zhodino, east of Minsk. BELAZ is a specialized manufacturer of heavy-duty and super-size load capacity dump trucks.

REUTERS

A man scavenges through rubbish in Athens.

AP Photo

Tourists admire the frozen Jsselmeer inland sea on Afsluitdijk in the northern Netherlands. Organizers of the near-mythical Eleven Cities Tour dealt 16,000 skaters and the nation at large a crushing blow Wednesday when they decided the ice was too thin to hold the 125-mile skating marathon for the first time in 15 years.

AP Photo

Flo Watson, 61, right, and her daughter Nina Watson, 34, center, view Flo’s late postal service co-worker Robert Sanders, 58, at the Robert L. Adams drive-through funeral parlor in Compton, Los Angeles. The funeral parlor has been in business since 1974, and is thought to be the only drive-through funeral home in southern California, according to office manager Denise Knowles-Bragg. Knowles-Bragg said the parlor offers a convenient alternative to older people who find it hard to walk, those who want to make a quick stop during the lunch hour, and the families of well-known deceased people who expect many visitors.

REUTERS

Indian police charge demonstrators during a protest against the newly-approved Drug Policy in Srinagar, the summer capital of Indian Kashmir. As per the new policy, it will be mandatory for doctors to prescribe medicines on the basis of generic name and not the brand name given by pharmaceutical companies.

EPA

Mount Etna spews lava on the southern Italian island of Sicily. Mount Etna is Europe’s tallest and most active volcano.

AP Photo

Followers of Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr chant anti-US slogans and wave Iraqi flags as they celebrate the US withdrawal in the Shiite stronghold of Sadr City.

AP Photo

A Syrian rebel runs for cover during an exchange of fire with army troops, unseen, in Idlib, Syria.

AP Photo

Russia’s Prime Minister Vladimir Putin gestures as he takes part in a conference held by the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs in Moscow.

REUTERS

A man bathes in an ice-hole in Lisi Lake, with the air temperature at about -21.2 degrees F, in Tbilisi, Georgia.

REUTERS

Boys are silhouetted against the setting sun as they exercise in a public park in the outskirts of Jammu, India.

REUTERS

A model presents a creation by Spanish designer Agatha Ruiz de la Prada for fashion house CLOE at the Soumaya museum in Mexico City.

REUTERS

Force India Formula One driver Jules Bianchi of France sits in his VJM05 after driving his car out of the track during a training session at the Jerez racetrack in southern Spain.

REUTERS

A man with a chain around his neck licks the shoes of a woman on a sidewalk during a performance in Wuhan, Hubei province. Four artists and art students presented the performance as part of a demonstration calling for equality for men and women.

REUTERS

A tourist sits in a hotel entrance next to an empty shop in the Pelourinho neighborhood in Salvador, Brazil.

AP Photo

Making tracks: A woman walks across a snow-covered square in Ostrava, Czech Republic. Europe has been battling a deep freeze that started in late January.

AP Photo

Riot police clash with demonstrators during a protest in Athens. Thousands took to the streets of Greece’s capital as unions launched a two-day general strike against planned austerity measures.